An important use of computers is the transfer of information over a network. Currently, the largest computer network in existence is the Internet. The Internet is a worldwide interconnection of computer networks that communicate using a common protocol. Millions of computers, from low end personal computers to high-end super computers are coupled to the Internet.
The Internet grew out of work funded in the 1960s by the U.S. Defense Department's Advanced Research Projects Agency. For a long time, Internet was used by researchers in universities and national laboratories to share information. As the existence of the Internet became more widely known, many users outside of the academic/research community (e.g., employees of large corporations) started to use Internet to carry electronic mail.
In 1989, a new type of information system known as the World-Wide Web ("the Web") was introduced to the Internet. Early development of the Web took place at CERN, the European Particle Physics Laboratory. The Web is a wide-area hypermedia information retrieval system aimed to give wide access to a large universe of documents. At this time, the Web was known to and used by the academic/research community only. There was no easily available tool which allows a technically untrained person to access the Web.
In 1993, researchers at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NSCA) released a Web browser called "Mosiac" that implemented a graphical user interface (GUI). Mosiac's graphical user interface was simple to learn yet powerful. The Mosiac browser allows a user to retrieve documents from the Web using simple point-and-click commands.
The architecture of the Web follows a conventional client-server model. The terms "client" and "server" are used to refer to a computer's general role as a requester of data (the client) or provider of data (the server). In the Web environment, Web browsers are clients and Web documents reside on servers. Web clients and Web servers communicate using a protocol called "Hypertext Transfer Protocol" (HTTP). A browser opens a connection to a server and initiates a request for a document. The server delivers the requested document, typically in the form of a text document coded in a standard Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) format. The server serves a passive role. It accepts commands from the client and sends data to the client, but cannot request the client to perform any action.
Portions of documents displayed on the Web contain hypertext links. The hypertext links link graphics or text on one document with another document on the Web. Each hypertext link is associated with a Universal Resource Locator (URL). A URL specifies a server and a particular document on that server. When a user selects a hypertext link, using, for instance, a cursor, the graphical browser connects to the server and retrieves the document(s) specified by the URL(s).
Some servers provide a means for searching a collection of documents. Upon initial request, the server supplies a form to the browser. The user, using the graphical browser, enters data such as keywords on this form as part of a search query and then opens a new connection to the server and submits this data to the server. The server responds to this request with a new document listing some or all of the documents matching those key words or other data requested by the browser. Each document listed normally includes a hypertext link to the actual document so that the user may easily retrieve that document (as they would any other link).
While Web servers and clients, such as Mosaic, have opened the door to on-line publishers and consumers of information, these services have only been available to those having an Internet connection. In other words, individuals that do not have a direct Internet connection, including a computer and a data channel to the Internet, cannot search for documents and other resources available through the Web. It is desirable to allow searching for documents on the Web (or other such network) to individuals that do not have such a direct connection.
The present invention provides access to the Web to individuals that do not have a computer or connection to the Internet or other network/resource supply. The present invention allows individuals to search for (and retrieve) documents on the Web as if actually connected to the Web individually. In this manner, the present invention allows an individual to have client capabilities when that individual does not have a direct connection to a network.